Locked so deep inside
by Joey Potter
Summary: What did Sirius' family feel when Sirius was thrown in Azkaban? This story will tell us. (MILD slash R/S)


Disclaimer: I don't own Sirius, Remus, Harry, Lily, Peter, James, Azkaban or the Ministry of Magic. I do own Geraldo, Bianca, Vega, Cassiopeia, Andromeda and Lyra.  
  
A/N: I've seen a lot of fics about how Remus felt when Sirius was thrown in Azkaban, but none about how Sirius' family felt. That's why I asked them. And they told me. This is what happened when the Black family realised that their son and brother was a murderer.  
  
Sirius' father, Geraldo, is Spanish, if anyone was wondering about his name.  
  
You might not understand the title, but it's because I got the idea for this story while hearing Lonestar's 'Not A Day Goes By', and this line made me cry.  
  
And finally, a warning: This contains SLASH! Remus/Sirius, although nothing graphic - Remus in person isn't even in this (actually, neither is Sirius). But now you can't come and say you weren't warned!  
  
LOCKED SO DEEP INSIDE  
  
All day, Bianca Black had had a feeling that something was wrong. That something wasn't like it should be. She couldn't explain why she felt like that, but something was wrong, she knew that. Something was wrong with one of her children.  
  
Bianca had heard the myth that mothers sometimes feel it when something happens to one of their children, and she had experienced it herself more than once, so when someone knocked on her door, she walked out to the front door with misgivings.  
  
And when she opened the door and saw the looks on the faces of the two men on her doorstep, she knew she was right. Something had happened.  
  
Feeling numb, she asked the two men to come inside.  
  
"Mrs Black", one of them began, "We come from the Ministry of Magic, and we're here to tell you -" he broke off, apparently not knowing how to say what he had to say.  
  
"Am I right, if I say your son is Sirius Black?" asked the other one. Bianca's eyes widened.  
  
"Yes", she said, horrified. Sirius was her only son. "Has something happened to him?" Her lips felt dry, and she licked them, prepared to hear the worst.  
  
"You might have heard. yesterday night, James and Lily Potter were killed by You-Know-Who".  
  
"Of course I know that", said Bianca. Everyone had heard of how little Harry Potter had survived the Killing Curse. "What does that have to do with Sirius?"  
  
"Everything", one of the men said. "Sirius Orion Black is accused for giving the Potters away to You-Know-Who and for killing Peter Pettigrew and thirteen Muggles on an open street".  
  
Bianca felt all the blood leave her face and she had to sit down.  
  
"No", she said. "It can't be true. James was his best friend."  
  
"I'm afraid it is true, Mrs Black". The men explained how everything had happened, but Bianca had stopped listening. Her Sirius. Her clever, beautiful, popular, perfect son was a murderer. All she managed to understand of what the men told her, was that Sirius was going to Azkaban.  
  
"We'll leave now, Mrs Black", said one of the men, but Bianca didn't hear anything. The men found their way out.  
  
Bianca sat for a long time and stared. She saw nothing, she just stared. Before her inner eye, she saw Sirius as a baby, a toddler, as an eleven- year-old, out of himself with glee over going to Hogwarts. She saw him with James. Oh, what those two hadn't done at Hogwarts. Sirius had always been wild. Funny. He had been a troublemaker extraordinaire, but he had never done anything to hurt people on purpose unless they deserved it. He had always defended his friends. She saw him as a seventeen-year-old, telling her and the rest of his family that he was a bisexual, and had found himself a boyfriend. None other than Remus Lupin. Bianca had supported him wholly in it, also when he told her that he and Remus had found themselves an apartment and would be moving in together soon.  
  
But Sirius. killing anyone? Sirius, a Death Eater? She couldn't believe it. But she had heard the stories about how You-Know-Who brainwashed his followers, and maybe Sirius.  
  
Bianca breathed heavily. She couldn't bring herself to believe what her Sirius had done. How could it be him? Her wonderful son. She looked around her in the living room. Pictures of him were everywhere. Pictures of Sirius smiling his mischievous smile. Sirius with his big sister Vega and his three younger sisters, Cassiopeia, Andromeda and Lyra, Sirius with Remus, and. Sirius with James.  
  
When James' parents had died, three months before summer holidays between fifth and sixth year, James had come to live with Sirius. Later on, when James and Lily became a couple, James had moved to her house, and when they were out of Hogwarts, they bought themselves a house. But even though James had only lived with them for a year and a half, he was like an honorary child to the Black family, and Sirius was only happy to have another boy in the house.  
  
And now. James was dead. And Lily too. Sirius was worse than dead.  
  
Before the day was over, the whole Black family knew about how Sirius had killed fourteen people and as good as killed two more.  
  
No one understood. They couldn't bring themselves to understand that their beloved son and brother could do such a thing.  
  
Vega, the eldest and Sirius' only big sister, screamed and yelled herself hoarse as she told Sirius off, and finally sank down to cry with her head in her hands.  
  
Cassiopeia shook her head. For almost an hour she just sat there silent, shaking her head from side to side, as though hoping someone would tell her it wasn't true.  
  
Andromeda cried out loud. She cried with loud screams and tears and agony as terrible as the one who lost someone dearly beloved.  
  
Lyra, the youngest at seventeen, buried her head in her pillow and cried silently. She cried without a pause for a whole day, and in the month following, she began crying if she was reminded of Sirius in just the slightest way.  
  
Geraldo, Sirius' father, didn't say or do anything. He just walked out of the house and stayed outside for many hours. Bianca found him in the shed outside. When she walked in, he had his back to her, but he still began talking.  
  
"I spent so much time with him out here", he said. "I can see him so clearly, holding a saw and sawing so the sweat sprang from his forehead. He was so proud of the tree house I helped him build." Geraldo ran his hand over a piece of wood. "He told me so much when we where out here. This was our place. This was where we could be men. Our place of refuge when the girls became too much". Bianca laid her arms around him.  
  
"How are you feeling, Bianca?" he asked her. That was something he often did. If someone didn't look as they did normally, Geraldo would ask them that question. Four simple words, which had done so much. Every time they had put words on their feelings for him, they had felt much better, no matter what it was. This time, however, Bianca knew it wouldn't help. Nevertheless, she took a deep breath and said:  
  
"I feel like a part of me is missing. My heart is split into six parts. One for you, and one for each of the children. Today, one of the parts broke off. It has been replaced by a stone. I feel cold. I hate Sirius, but yet I can't do that, because he's my child. I carried him under my heart, I saw him grow up, I raised him. No matter what, it's impossible for a mother to hate her child, and I blame myself for that. I know I should hate him for everything he's done, but I can't." she trailed off, knowing he understood her. Knowing, that he felt the same way.  
  
Days went by, and things became a little more normal in the Black household. Vega and Andromeda had moved back home with the rest of the family. None of the girls' boyfriends came visiting, and everyone was thankful. They needed time alone to grow whole again.  
  
A week after the terrible news, Bianca sat alone in the living room and once again, she looked around at the pictures. Sirius. Sirius looked at her from everywhere. His shiny black hair, inherited from his father, curling around his neck. His pale skin and his twinkling blue eyes, inherited from her. oh, that he should look like her in any way! In a rush, she stood up, grabbed the picture closest to her, a framed portrait of a fifteen-year-old Sirius, and hurled it into the floor with all her might. The glass splintered, and Sirius' face couldn't be seen clearly anymore.  
  
Every single picture of Sirius was ruined, and on the ones with anyone else, Sirius was torn away and ripped into small bits.  
  
Finally, when not one picture of Sirius was left, Bianca sank down on the floor and hid her face in her hands. Then came the tears. Bianca hadn't cried in the past week, but now came all the tears that had built up inside her, and she cried and cried and cried.  
  
Lyra, who had heard the ripping noises, came down the stairs to see what was happening. When she saw her mum on the floor, she silently walked in and took one of the pictures from the floor. It was almost torn apart, but she could still see Sirius' face and his twinkling eyes. She crumbled it in her hands and sat down besides her mum, crying silently.  
  
Andromeda, Cassiopeia and Vega came into the living room one by one, and joined Lyra around their mum.  
  
But even though all four girls cried silently with her, none of them could reach their mum. None of them could, how much they had loved Sirius, understand the pain their mother felt. She was lost in her own world, where only pain and agony was present.  
  
Bianca cried for hours. It was dark when she finally ran out of tears and on shaking legs made her way into the kitchen, where she made herself a cup of tea and then sat down at the kitchen table with a pen and a piece of paper. She was going to write a letter.  
  
The hours ticked by, and Bianca's tea became cold. She hadn't written anything yet. She couldn't put words on what she wanted to say, but she needed to write this letter. She didn't know why, but she had to. It was almost two in the morning, before she finally managed to write the first line.  
  
Dear Remus. 


End file.
